Table Of ContentThe Last Queen
of Kashmir
RAKESH K. KAUL
HarperCollins Publishers India
To
Pushpadanta, who fell from Heaven, for his transgression of invisibly
eavesdropping on the divine Great Tale and then retelling it to his wife.
Thus was manifested the first drop in the Ocean of the Stream of Stories.
Contents
Foreword
Principals
Prologue: Battal Balian Refugee Camp
Ekamgrantha (Book I) The Student
Wave 1 The School and the Temple
Wave 2 The Fortress
Wave 3 The Throne
Wave 4 The Damaras
Dvegrantha (Book II) The Hostage
Wave 5 The Tourist
Wave 6 Close Encounters
Wave 7 The Peahen and the Serpent
Wave 8 Bonhomie
Tregrantha (Book III) The Gambit
Wave 9 The Marriage
Wave 10 Lion of Kashmir
Wave 11 The World Is One Family
Chaturgrantha (Book IV) The Householder
Wave 12 The Love Birds
Wave 13 Governance
Wave 14 Goddess
Wave 15 Epicentre
Wave 16 Ascent
Wave 17 Polo
Panchamgrantha (Book V) Born Again
Wave 18 Descent
Wave 19 Avian Flu
Wave 20 Parting
Wave 21 Forever
Epilogue
Endnotes
Bibliography
Glossary of Kashmiri, Sanskrit and Farsi terms
Acknowledgements
About the Book
About the Author
Praise for The Last Queen of Kashmir
Copyright
Fourteenth-century Map of Kashmir
Reprinted with permission from: W. Slaje, Kingship in Kashmir (AD 1148–1459). Halle 2014
Not drawn to scale
Fourteenth-century Map of Srinagar
Reprinted with permission from: W. Slaje, Kingship in Kashmir (AD 1148–1459). Halle 2014
Not drawn to scale
Foreword
I
STUMBLED on Kota by accident.
I was researching the Dhar clan of Kashmir to which my wife belongs.
Among the Dhar luminaries is the great liberator of Kashmir, Pandit Birbal
Dhar. An influential tax collector serving under the tyrannical regime of the
Afghans, who had ruled Kashmir from 1750 to the early nineteenth century,
he led a secret appeal to Maharaja Ranjit Singh to take over the Kashmir
Valley. Travelling with his son, Birbal Dhar had left his wife and daughter-
in-law in hiding with Qudus, his milkman. Judas emerged in the form of a
family relative, Tilak Chand Munshi, who betrayed the whereabouts of the
women to the governor, Azim Khan.
Troops were sent to bring the two women to the governor’s palace.
Birbal’s wife was a noted beauty and she knew that Khan would dishonour
her to avenge Birbal’s secret mission. History records that she swallowed
poison and that her last words were: ‘Know that Kashmir has yet a Kota
Rani. Remember me to my Lord!’
Who was this Kota Rani? Who was this inspiring symbol of feminine
resistance that was central to the social history that Kashmiri Pandit women
carried with them over the intervening centuries? The bare facts were easily
accessible, but did not justify the banner that Kota represented for Birbal’s
wife; clearly there was much more hidden behind the veil of time. Thus
began my twenty-first-century journey through the detritus of Kota’s
fourteenth-century world to try and put the pieces together.
What I found astonished me and would challenge every single
preconception that anybody else or I might have about Kashmir. What I
uncovered was a treasure that held the supreme secret for humanity. What
shone bright was Kashmir’s beacon to the known world, and Kota was its
queen. What sobered me was that Kota was surrounded by literary geniuses.
Ninety per cent of Indic poetry is in Sanskrit, and virtually all of Indic
literature in Kota’s time, were in the form of poetry and had been written by
Kashmiris! The works of these poets were invaluable as I began the
sometimes painful task of reconstructing what had been sundered apart.
In my zeal to be true to Kota, I realized that my writing was synthetic and
not true to the great masters of Kashmir. So I adopted a literary style that
would be authentic to the story. Kashmiri literary principles, including
Kavya, the poetic expressions, among other things, emphasize that
historical stories are first and foremost an art form. The Pandits were the
pioneers of storytelling and practitioners of edutainment. A story needed to
both educate and entertain: it had to be for all ages and be indestructible.
The author had to approach the subject with a love where the very thought
would create an emotion similar to that of the mother hearing the cry of her
newborn baby. This tug should create an aesthetic experience that builds
oneness between the observer and the observed. While the written word
could wear ornaments and draw power from suggestion, the end product
had to be perfected reality into which the reader gets immersed. There
should be multiple levels of interpretation and at the highest levels it should
lead to self-discovery and consciousness. There is an ocean there, and this
might give you, the reader, an appreciation as to why between the research
and the writing of this manuscript it took ten years to craft and complete.
This is the first literary property to be published in the English language
that uses Kashmir’s formidable literary principles. And just as one
experiences exhilaration when driving a performance car and fully
appreciates the engineering beneath the bonnet, similarly the global reader
should enjoy the reading experience but be aware that the craftsmanship is
totally Kashmiri. After the Mahabharata and the Rajatarangini, The Last
Queen of Kashmir is the third and only book to be written in the Virasa rasa
style, which is considered to be an impossible style to capture in words.
Virasa rasa is very different from the catharsis of Greek tragedies, but
instead reflects the bitter-sweet taste of Santa rasa, the peaceful rasa. It is
the play of dharma in an imperfect world of moral decay; it is a distasteful
inoculation, but one that hopefully leads to a healthier life. In this sense,
this book represents a new voice from Kashmir.
Kota was once asked: What is the one thing that you need to know in
order to know everything? When it comes to Kota and her Kashmir, this is
it, this is it.
Principals
Sharada Supreme female deity of Kashmir and name of town
Ramachandra Commander-in-chief of Kashmir and father of Kota
Kota Queen of Kashmir
Brahma Kota’s love
Ravan Kota’s brother
Suhdev Deposed king of Kashmir and first suitor of Kota
Rinchina Immigrant and first husband of Kota
Haider Chander First son of Kota (fathered by Rinchina)
Younger brother of Suhdev and second husband of
Udyandev
Kota
Jatta Bhola
Second son of Kota (fathered by Udyan)
Rattan
Dulucha Turcoman invader of Kashmir sent to capture Kota
Achala Another invader of Kashmir and suitor of Kota
Shah Mir Immigrant and final suitor of Kota
Daughter of Shah Mir, married to Raja Sapru of
Guhara
Bhringi
Devaswami Chief pontiff of Kashmir
Kokur Theatre impresario
Fakir Wandering Islamic puritan
